u/eejcat

i genuinely feel so stupid right now.
i have a few pairs of earrings that are technically silver underneath, but have a gold-colored coating/plating on the outside. they’re not actually gold, they’re just silver earrings that have been made gold-colored somehow (i honestly don’t know the exact process and i don’t remember the name of the metal used).
i recently moved out of my house for university, and of course i forgot to bring the jewelry cleaner i normally use for them.
unfortunately, i did have a diluted bleach solution with 1.5% sodium hypochlorite.

i already knew bleach was going to damage the earrings because it had already happened. for some reason i thought that if i diluted it enough with water and only left them in for about 30 minutes, they would probably be fine. figured i could put them in while i took a shower, take them out afterward, rinse them really well, and that would be it. except i forgot about them for two or three hours.
when i finally remembered and took them out i wanted to cry. they were completely opaque and dull-looking, and the gold color had been seriously damaged.
one pair in particular looks awful, almost all of the gold color is gone and the whole surface looks cloudy.
and i’m SO MAD.

it’s not even because they were expensive. the problem is that i recently moved out and basically got rid of all my other everyday earrings because i wanted to keep only my really good/valuable ones. these were my everyday earrings i could wear constantly and not worry about them.

the worst part is that i feel so stupid telling my mom because i KNOW she’s going to say we should take them to a jeweler and see if they can fix them. but i don’t even know what i’m supposed to tell the jeweler.
“hi, i knew bleach would damage these, so i put them in diluted bleach anyway and then forgot about them for several hours. can you fix them?”
i’m honestly embarrassed because this was completely avoidable. i knew better.

TL;DR** **i soaked my gold-plated silver earrings in diluted bleach, knowing it could damage them, and then forgot about them for hours. now they’re cloudy and one pair has almost completely lost its gold color. i’m absolutely furious with myself